Agents for the few, queues for the many – or agents for all?

Inequality in accessing public services is prevalent worldwide. In the UK, “priority fees” for services like passport issuance or Schengen visas allow the affluent to expedite the process. In Brazil, the middle class hires “despachantes”, intermediaries who navigate bureaucratic hurdles on their behalf. Add technology to the mix, and you get businesses like South Africa’s WeQ4U, which help the privileged sidestep the vehicle licensing queues that others endure daily. An African exception? Hardly. In the U.S., landlords use paid online services to expedite rental property licensing, while travelers pay annual fees for faster airport security screening.

If AI development continues and public sector services fail to evolve, inequalities in access will only grow. AI agents, capable of handling tasks like form filling and queries, have the potential to transform access to public services. But rather than embracing this potential, the public sector risks turning a blind eye, or worse, banning these tools outright, leaving those without resources even further behind.

The result? The private sector will have to navigate the gaps, finding ways to make AI agents work with rigid public systems. Often, this will mean operating in a legal grey zone, where the agents neither confirm nor deny they are software, masquerading as applicants themselves. Accountants routinely log into government tax portals using their clients’ credentials, acting as digital proxies without any formal delegation system. If human intermediaries are already “impersonating” their clients in government systems, it is easy to envision AI agents seamlessly stepping into this role.

This is a sample post seeded from Tiago’s earlier essay to demonstrate the layout. Replace with the full text or delete.